


stay awake

by orphan_account



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan, Unwind Dystology - Neal Shusterman
Genre: Crossover, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-06
Updated: 2014-04-06
Packaged: 2018-01-16 18:28:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1357531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mikasa has known from a young age that such a world as this reeked of unpleasant smells, yet no matter how much you tried you could never rid of them. She was taught from a young age to fight, then the will to fight took away her name and replaced it with the names of organs and bones.</p>
            </blockquote>





	stay awake

**Author's Note:**

> I meant to have this written a week ago oops

i.

The winds speaks in the foreign tongue of freedom while the birds mock them with their gold-dipped wings. Freedom. The word falls off her tongue, lost in the silence which boxes them into neat rows. Such a thing never did exist.

Mikasa looks back at the two people behind her – childhood friends condemned to the same fate as she – but a smile does not grace her lips when she sees they are, in fact, still whole. Smiles are such trivial things.

“Eren, move quickly. The parts pirates are close behind.” Her words pass by him with an effect more beneficial than she could have anticipated. His pace quickens and she is reminded of a time when such words would make him protest, but now none of them wish to die.

 

ii.

She has known from a young age that such a world as this reeked of unpleasant smells yet no matter how much you tried you could never rid of them. She was taught from a young age to fight, then the will to fight took away her name and replaced it with the names of organs and bones.

The fire tonight is large enough to warm their thin fingers and small enough that they will remain undetected in this forest. Mikasa watches. Armin sleeps. Eren seethes. By now, the hatred between all three of them is enough to give them a will society considers dangerous.

“Do you hate him?”

“What?”

“Do you hate him?” Mikasa repeats. Her eyes look up at the stars which shine so dimly on them and decides that she is not quite pleased with them.

“Of course I do. What idea of question is that, Mikasa?” Eren's words bite at her with accusation but she remains calm. One of them must. A breeze runs along the branches of the trees, rustling the leaves. She thinks briefly that she should hate him, hate this man who took her in then gave her up in the same breath, but she finds that hate is only useful when directed at the whole instead of the parts.

 

iii.

The newcomers appear at dawn, their feet blistered and skin sunburnt. The blond girl's expression of disinterest rivals even Mikasa's while the two rarely speak. More important matters are at hand than making enemies with the people who are in the same boat.

The only one who actively talks within the trio is the muscular boy named Reiner, but his eyes still refuse to tell too many secrets.

 

iv.

Darkness washes over them like a disease once night falls. Mikasa stays awake out of necessity; Annie stays awake out of habit. Two weeks have passed since three became six. Two weeks have passed without any sign of the Juvy cops. Two weeks have given Mikasa a paranoia that she can no longer contain.

Silence follows quickly after the darkness, but silence only leads to thoughts that Mikasa will never wish to ponder over, so she breaks it. “Where did you come from?” She knows little to nothing about these people other than what she can tell from their body language. The fact would not bother her had she not been on the run for the lives of two others she has sworn to protect.

Annie's words are practically forced passed her lips. "The mountains." And just like that the conversation ends. It is then, in a moment of strained silence that is no longer natural, that Mikasa decides Annie is neither an enemy nor an ally.

 

v. 

“Armin! Armin, _run_!” The words fly past her lips with no forethought but in such a moment she lets the matter slide. Armin races in front of her, his legs suddenly appearing so fragile in the light. She dares to look behind at the demons on her heels and ducks as a traq gun is fired, her gaze once again focusing on the unknown ahead of her. A head of brown hair bobs in and out of her peripheral vision but the knowledge that Eren is still intact does little to quench her worry.

A muffled thud sounds behind her and despite knowing he is still alive, images of Eren unconscious fill the gaps in her mind where hatred has not yet spread—

–Eren kicking, screaming at the Juvies, doing everything to get away—

–Eren's blood splattering the forest, his hands ripped from his body, the luxury of tools stolen away from him—

–Eren's green eyes on a child's whose blue ones are now a faint memory—

–Eren's scalp atop a man who sees not lives but parts—

–Eren's lips on a too-thin face—

 She comes to a forceful stop, her body spinning to see not Eren as the image of the martyr but Bertholdt, and a relief washes over her that could never be quenched by the guilt. She sees the Juvies – five of them, there had been ten – firing their traq guns but she does not process this until the world begins to fade and the screams she once heard have been reduced to whispers.

* * *

The world she opens her eyes to is terribly quiet with only the crickets to act as a chorus. The world is dark, and from a quick scan of her surroundings once she awakens she determines she is the only one awake. Or so she thought because Annie turns her head and stares at her with cold eyes. "You weren't out long."

"How long?"

"About six hours. You should be dead."

They all should be dead, but Mikasa doesn't say that. Instead her eyes drift to Eren's sleeping form. Even in sleep he is restless. Her gaze catches the sliver of the moon high in the sky, mocking them. Her hand moves to the knife on her belt, yet danger is not imminent. But in a hour, a day, a week it will be so she must be prepared. Someone has to be.

 

vi.

Reiner goes first.

 

vii.

When the snow starts falling they are in the middle of a city none of the have been in before. They wear clothes they have never worn and speak phrases they have never heard. They never look into anyone's eyes unless necessary and they never go to the same place twice.

It takes a week to escape.

 

viii.

Bertholdt's head hangs in his hands. Mikasa knows he is hurting but the threat of dying which looms over their heads is more of a concern. But Reiner was competent. He would have survived.

She doesn't voice her opinion because she knows it is a lie.

 

ix.

Armin finds the first safe house.

The building breaks and bends with each glance they steal; cracks form in the wooden floors with each step. Armin sleeps first, grateful for the relief sleep brings. Eren sleeps only when exhaustion takes him. Annie, Mikasa, and Bertholdt stay awake out of necessity. Or, that's what they tell themselves.

Within hours the wind is howling against the trees, creating a harsh whistling too eerie to be natural. Snow falls continuously from the darkened sky and they sit with a silence growing between them.

“Bertholdt,” Mikasa begins, her voice soft. “where were you going?”

He hesitates. He thinks. “Away.” But there is more to the story than that. Mikasa will not pressure him and he will not say it willingly, and she decides the answer is enough because all of them were going away once.

 

x.

After three weeks of running, hiding, and fighting, the group of five becomes a group of four.

 

xi.

Mikasa knows this is not her fault. She knows she has done everything in her power to save him, but in the end she forgot her own limitations.

 

xii.

She sees his eyes – blue like the sky, like the sea, like everything he had dreamed of seeing – on a small girl with her red hair in pigtails. She is maybe eight or nine, and Mikasa has to stop herself from taking them back. She has to tell herself that she cannot risk being caught.

 

xiii.

“Mikasa, you need to get some sleep.”

Bertholdt's words are barely above a whisper. She knows staying up will only waste her energy and she knows she is being foolish, yet she cannot bring herself to sleep. Sleep gives her the false sense of security she cannot afford to have.

“Mikasa.”

Her eyes move to Bertholdt's worried face – he looks as if he's going to panic at any moment – and she gives him a small nod. “I'll sleep soon.” He seems content with the answer so stops bothering her after that. The sound of the wind quickly erases the silence and the soft patter of feet across the floorboard remind Mikasa they are not the only creatures here. The building smells of mold but such a smell is more pleasant than others. From the look of the decaying flowers strewn across the floor this had once been a flower shop. She wonders, before she realizes how foolish it is, if the flowers would come back eventually.

Before she falls asleep, she sees Annie watching her, her lips pulled into a frown.

* * *

 

She wakes up first and, deciding the two deserve a rest, does not wake Eren or Bertholdt immediately. This building is secluded enough that no one will go looking for them. It's been so long that Mikasa doubts anyone is looking for them. Still, she cannot allow her guard to fall.

Annie sits off to the side away from everyone, a knife in her hand which she sharpens on a rock. Her blond hair is falling out of her bun; her concentration never wavers. “What?” Annie deadpans.

Mikasa searches for the words which should have come easily. “We are leaving soon.”

“I know.”

A silence falls between them like it had so many times before, but now the silence feels forced, unnatural, and the wind which fills it is more unwelcome than it had ever been.

“Sorry.” Annie's words are so quiet that Mikasa would not have heard her had the wind not chosen that moment to stop.

 

xiv.

On the rare nights she sleeps, Mikasa dreams of a world in which is surrounded by walls which tower around them, protecting them from a danger she is never able to see. During the day, she imagines that the world in her dreams is nothing compared to the world she lives.

 

xv.

Once, she dreams of falling, and the falling never stops even when she touches the ground and her bones break in a thousand different ways. After those dreams she never fully wakes up. She never wants to.


End file.
